This has been a long time coming and it is quite a story – but ultimately, it boils down to serious real-life issues overtaking my hobby time.
Long-time followers might notice that there is some promised content missing from Episode 2. This because some content (the Sidhe) is getting a total rework, other content became too large (the special character library) and some content wasn’t fun or just didn’t work out (army relics and the Menae army list).
There is a lot of planned content still to come so keep an eye on this site for further updates. Special thanks to everyone who contacted me during my hiatus to let me know they were enjoying my work.
The Cacowards are the best source of quality levels and gameplay mods for Doom. Anyone who wants to expand their experience of Doom engine gameplay should look there for the best mods and levels. That isn’t to say that it covers all quality content, but it’s certainly a good start.
Special mention for the 2x upscaling project – a project that uses multiple AIs in tandem to redraw the Doom sprites at double the resolution.
This is a trailer for Sonic Robo Blast 2 ver. 2.2.
SRB2 is a mod for Doom that creates a unique 3D Sonic game in the style of the older games. Honestly, it’s probably the best Sonic has ever been in 3D. That doesn’t mean it’s perfect (3d Sonic sets a low bar). The controls have always been too slippery for my liking which makes precision platforming a pain.
It’s nice to see this mod getting some love. It’s over two decades old (originally created in 1998), and it was a technical marvel (for the Doom engine) when it came out. The new release looks like it has added a lot of impressive new effects (destructible terrain using polyobjects!) and I’m looking forward to trying this.
Here’s a test piece for my Hell army for FRAG. It’s Pinky from Doom, taken from Thingiverse and printed using a slightly modified Seipie profile with tree supports.
There were a few flaws (part of the lip didn’t print properly) but mostly it just needs some clean up. This is printed on an Ender 3 FDM printer.
My 3D printer has arrived! It’s a Creality Ender 3. I’ve installed an aluminium extruder (replacing the default plastic extruder, which tends to wear or break) but otherwise the printer is a standard stock printer.
After assembling it and checking the build was correct, I made a center piece model for my demon army (28mm figure for scale).
This
Cyberdemon is from Thingiverse and printed in 13 separate parts, using a
modified SiePie miniature printing profile. It’s also made from an
environmentally friendly bio-plastic.
[Anonymous Question] “Do you have any doom mods in particular you recommend? I’m new to even the idea of modding it and don’t know where to start ??”
Gosh, there’s so much out there now! It’s hard to know what to recommend first without dumping way too much text.
Trailblazer
is a mod that turns you into a Snake Plissken-style bad ass. I always
come back to it, it’s lots of fun and probably my favourite at the
moment. https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?t=47494
Demonsteele is
Devil May Cry: Doom Edition. It’s a favorite and by the same author as
High Noon Drifter but it’s very different to normal play. Try something
else first. https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?t=46787
Combined Arms wasn’t originally a favourite, but the new update has really improved it and it just feels great. It’s a not a bad place to start as it’s a nice and simple armoury replacement. No extra controls or special moves, just new guns (and an optional monster replacement pack) https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?t=51066
Final Doomer
is a great weapon replacer that gives you a new armory themed around
five famous megawads (mega-wad = map pack that replaces all the levels
in Doom 2) and a tweaked version of the default armory.https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?t=55061
Off the top of my head, you want to keep an eye on TerminusEst, Combine Keegan and Pillowblaster. They’re putting out some good stuff.
The levels you pick will really affect your enjoyment. Try looking through the Cacowad’s (https://www.doomworld.com/cacowards/)
and downloading anything that appeals. ALL the stuff listed for the
Cacowad’s is quality – but it’s only some of the good stuff out there.
Finally, Doom Mod Madness
on YouTube always manages to find weird and interesting new mods. I
don’t watch as regularly as I used to, but it’s been a useful series for
me.
The mods above require GZDoom to play. I also highly
recommend using the ZDL launcher because eventually you’ll have way too
many files in your core Doom folder to do the drag and drop thing. Let
me know if you need any help with that.
Even if you don’t play Doom, or want to get into it, it does let you know about some of the crazy stuff that’s been made by the community over the past 25 years.
Hexenmapper has been working on some monster replacements for Heretic and posting them in the HUMP discord server.
I
asked if I could use them, since I want to make an expanded ‘Doom 2′
style monster roster for Heretic and he’s already made an Arch Vile type
creature. He said yes, because he’s a really cool person.
I’m going to walk you through the inside of a simple monster replacer mod. Let’s have a look at what sort of stuff is inside…
1) First I’ll have to open SLADE, so I can rummage around the data file.
2) Then I’ll find my data file. Luckily I keep everything well organized…
3) Here’s what the inside of a Doom (or Heretic, or Hexen, or Strife…) wad file looks like:
4) This is the DECORATE file. Decorate is a language added to sourceports that let’s you create new monsters and effects without much technical know-how. Pictured below is an Arch Vile type monster that resurrects enemies
5) Hexenmapper has been hard at work; every non-Boss in Heretic is now replaced by an identical copy with a resurrection animation (their death animation played backwards). Because the other two new monsters replace Heretic’s ‘ghost’ enemies, those monsters’ resurrectable versions are disabled (but can easily be turned back on)
6) Let’s have a look at the graphics for the new Yuan-Ti Monsters. As you can see, it’s a “Frankensprite” of the Ophidian and the Brown Chaos Serpent enemies.
7) The side view had some sprite tearing I thought. However, other views of the Yuan Ti are very well done.
8) Holy cow, that’s how it attacks? That lightning attack looks cool as hell
9) The Arch Vile type monster is a smaller version of Hexen’s Korax
10) The third new monster is an Archer, based on the Hexen II enemy. This is from Realm 667 and modified from the existing Archer resource.
11) The Credits List
So for reference:
DECORATE contains the programming for the monsters (health, movement, properties, lists of sprites to use for each animation cycle, etc) SNDINFO is ‘sound information’ which assigns labels to the sound files so that the Decorate file can tell the game which sounds to play GLDEFS tells the game to light up the area around monsters when they’re using their magic attacks The rest is sound and graphics data that get used by DECORATE and SNDINFO.
Will I use it? In a modified form, probably.
I
was thinking of using the Korax sprite for a boss monster so I might
change swap the graphics. I certainly can’t ignore the work put into
making each Heretic monster resurrectable though!
I think the archer would make a good “shotgun sergeant”, perhaps if I made their attack more like an ethereal crossbow attack.
I may have already put in a monster that does what the Yuan-ti does, so that one might not be used.
I’m currently playing through some Call of Doom. It’s a Doom mod by Arrowood (possibly the only Japanese person alive who likes both Call of Duty and Doom*)
and it’s great fun. Sadly the coding is all over the place. This isn’t
entirely the author’s fault as CODoom requires Brutal Doom** to run.
Both
of those mods have seen a lot of development since I last played them.
Unfortunately, changes to both mods and GZDoom are making it harder to
play the most up-to-date versions. I wish both mod creators would just
focus on making optimized, error-free versions of their works which only
require one file placed into the launcher.
Oh well. Call of Doom is good fun all the same. It has ear ruining sound effects, requires about six mods in a specific load order, and it runs like ass, but it’s still able to give a visceral thrill every time you blast an imp to pieces from across the room. You have to respect that.
*
There must be other Japanese FPS fans given that JPCP.wad is a thing,
but the possibility exists that they’re all just Arrowood wearing
several different combinations of hats and false beards.
** A legendary mod whose code perfectly resembles an enormous plate of spaghetti.
